Licking County company awaits OK for injection well near Utica

Some Utica residents upset at process of approval for injection site near county line

Nov. 21, 2012

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Advocate Reporter

What is a Class II disposal well?

As part of U.S. EPA’s Underground Injection Control program, Class II disposal wells are used to inject brine, associated with the extraction of oil and natural gas, deep underground. According to the U.S. EPA, more than 144,000 Class II wells inject more than 2 billion gallons of brine every day in the United States. Source: Ohio Department of Natural Resources

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For more information,visit NewarkAdvocate.com/fracking.

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NEWARK — The Ohio Department of Natural Resources could approve a permit for a Class II salt water injection well at a Knox County site just north of Utica by the end of the year.

Knox Energy, based in Jersey Township, north of Pataskala, awaits a decision from the state on its application for an injection well to dispose of fluid from some of its 280 production wells in Licking and Knox counties.

If approved, the injection well could receive oil field waste fluids, including fluid from hydraulic fracturing, called fracking.

“We’ve been waiting nine to 10 months,” said Mark Jordan, owner and president of Knox Energy. “It’s just been a long process.

“We’re doing it because we’ve drilled so many wells in the last five years, we need a place to put our own production water. We wanted to streamline our costs.”

The state halted approval of such permits after about a dozen earthquakes in northeastern Ohio were thought to have been induced by injection of gas-drilling waste water into the earth, according to oil and gas regulators.

The Knox County property is in Morgan Township, just north of U.S. 62 on County Road 28.

Knox Energy, which has about 570 production wells in Ohio, uses the hydraulic fracturing process but drills only vertically — into Clinton Sandstone and Knox Unconformity — not the horizontal drilling into shale, Jordan said.

The fluids that will be injected, Jordan said, will include little from hydraulic fracturing.

“By volume, the percentage will be very low, if any, chemicals,” Jordan said. “It’s mainly local water put back into the ground. It’s the way the state of Ohio likes to have it done.”

The state’s review of the Knox Energy application is almost complete, said ODNR spokeswoman Heidi Hetzel Evans.

A 15-day public comment period on the Knox Energy application occurred in August, when no objections were filed and no requests were made for a public hearing.

Bill Baker, organizer of Frack Free Ohio, said the state only will consider comments from a geologist or hydrologist, and public advertisements are limited.

“It’s a little discouraging that no one made any comment,” Baker said. “Folks that say they don’t want them aren’t given much relevance. The whole public comment period is a sham.”

An advertisement ran for five days in the Mount Vernon News before the public comment period, Hetzel Evans said. The relevancy of the objections are based on their relationship to public health and safety or conservation of natural resources.

A public hearing can be called but it’s at the discretion of the chief of the ODNR’s Oil and Gas Resources Management.

Shirley Curtis, a Utica resident who lives less than two miles from the proposed well site, said she just got involved with the issue and became frustrated with the apathy of her neighbors.

“I have tried and tried to talk to people in Utica and they are not even aware,” Curtis said. “Most of them don’t even know what it is and don’t seem concerned.

“They just don’t get it. I feel like I’m living in the dark ages. Maybe they just believe nobody would harm the environment.”

Carol Apacki, a member of Licking County Concerned Citizens, said the fracked fluids injected into the ground present a potential danger to the environment.

“We’re putting in unknown, untested chemicals, coming from all over the country, into Ohio. What assurances do people have in the area and what recourse do they have with the threat of contamination?”

The state has performed tests of the fracked fluid being injected, Hetzel Evans said.

“We’ve instituted some spot testing and it is made up of what we expect it to be made up of,” Hetzel Evans said. “Our guidelines must match or go above federal guidelines.”

The state approved four injection well permits this past week and has 30 more permit applications to review. None of the applications are in Licking County, but there are two in Muskingum County, one in Morrow County and the one in Knox County.

Jordan said Knox Energy primarily will inject fluids from its own production wells, but may accept fluids from other sources.

“We might consider (others), but on a low-volume basis because we want to keep capacity for our own (production) wells.”